6-5 Blackjack: Why You Should Never Play It
Casinos just found a new way to get more money out of you. The name for it is - 6-5 Blackjack. It's the latest trend in casinos and you need to understand what it means if you care about your money. Oh sure, everyone who goes to a casino know they are going to lose at least some of their money to it. But why make it easy for them and why give more than you should?
Let's take a look at 6-5 Blackjack.
6-5 Blackjack is a variant of the game in which the casino pays 6 to 5 for a natural blackjack. If you don't know what this is, it is any two-card, starting hand combination that adds up to 21. Traditionally, casinos paid 3 to 2 to a player who got a blackjack. So for a $10 bet, you win $15. But in 6-5 Blackjack, the payout is much smaller. For a $10, it only pays $12. This change in the payout adds 1.39% to the house edge.
As you can see, 6-5 Blackjack is good for the casino and bad for the player. It's obvious they will want to promote it, and they are. But how can they lure people into playing it?
Single Decks and Card Counting
The answer lies in the card counting phenomenon. Casinos hate card counters. The 6-5 Blackjack variant is not only a way for the house to make more money, it is also a way to get even with these pesky advantage players.
Card counting was originally designed to work with single deck blackjack games. When card counting became popular, the casinos replaced single deck games with multiple deck or shoe games. This was to make card counting less effective since there would be more cards to count. Card counters were forced to either adapt to the new multiple deck games, or look for the few single deck games still available.
Now the casinos got an idea from this. Since the card counters like single decks so much, why not give it to them?
So the casinos have started offering single deck games again - with one catch: These games pay 6 to 5 on a blackjack.
If you are a new player with only a faint knowledge of blackjack and card counting, you will see a single deck blackjack game and think, "Wow, a single deck game! I can win big with card counting!" But that is what the house wants you to think. Don't be fooled. What advantage you can get from a single deck is offset by the 6 to 5 blackjack payout.
In short, avoid the 6-5 games at all events. And if you see a single deck game offered, check its blackjack payout. If it is 6-5, move on.